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Javier E

For Poorer and Richer - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...hat-for-poorer-and-richer.html

inequality culture values permissiveness nurture

shared by Javier E on 15 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • lower-income Americans have more money, experience less poverty, and receive far more safety-net support than their grandparents ever did. Over all, material conditions have improved, not worsened, across the period when their communities have come apart.
  • Between 1979 and 2010, for instance, the average after-tax income for the poorest quintile of American households rose from $14,800 to $19,200; for the second-poorest quintile, it rose from $29,900 to $39,100.
  • Meanwhile, per-person antipoverty spending at the state and federal level increased sixfold between 1968 and 2008
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • the basic point is this: In a substantially poorer American past with a much thinner safety net, lower-income Americans found a way to cultivate monogamy, fidelity, sobriety and thrift to an extent that they have not in our richer, higher-spending present.
  • So however much money matters, something else is clearly going on.
  • The post-1960s cultural revolution isn’t the only possible “something else.” But when you have a cultural earthquake that makes society dramatically more permissive and you subsequently get dramatic social fragmentation among vulnerable populations, denying that there is any connection looks a lot like denying the nose in front of your face.
  • recognizing that culture shapes behavior and that moral frameworks matter doesn’t require thundering denunciations of the moral choices of the poor.
  • our upper class should be judged first — for being too solipsistic to recognize that its present ideal of “safe” permissiveness works (sort of) only for the privileged, and for failing to take any moral responsibility (in the schools it runs, the mass entertainments it produces, the social agenda it favors) for the effects of permissiveness on the less-savvy, the less protected, the kids who don’t have helicopter parents turning off the television or firewalling the porn.
malonema1

Trump walks back sanctions against Russia, contradicting Nikki Haley - TODAY.com - 0 views

www.today.com/...ting-nikki-haley-1212661827918

trump politics US

shared by malonema1 on 01 May 18 - No Cached
  • Trump walks back sanctions against Russia, contradicting Nikki Haley
  • President Trump is walking back plans to impose new economic sanctions against Russia announced Sunday by U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. 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  • Amid the historic developments formally ending the Korean War, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has promised to close down a nuclear test site in May. 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  • ...1 more annotation...
  • North Korea to close down nuclear test site in May
manhefnawi

The Succession and Foreign Policy | History Today - 0 views

www.historytoday.com/...succession-and-foreign-policy

Elizabeth Philip II Mary Queen of Scots France Spain

shared by manhefnawi on 16 May 18 - No Cached
  • the diplomatic nightmare of the trial and execution of Mary, Queen of Scots
  • the French crown maintained the only permanent embassy of Elizabeth’s reign
  • The Spanish embassy was a stormy one, suspended between 1572 and 1578 and permanently terminated in 1584
  • ...23 more annotations...
  • Rivalries within the royal family lay at the heart of English politics between the reigns of Edward III (1327-77) and Henry VII (1485-1509), not least the Wars of the Roses. This was also the case in France and Scotland in the second half of the sixteenth century. The Habsburgs provide the exception: with only a few lapses, they were almost the model of family loyalty
  • As an heir of Henry VII, Mary could not challenge the legitimacy of the Tudor line as a whole
  • If Anne Boleyn was as promiscuous as was charged, then Henry VIII’s paternity was in doubt
  • Illegitimacy was used to justify the removal of Elizabeth and Mary from the succession in Edward VI’s settlement of the crown on Lady Jane Grey in 1553. This was of major significance. If the events of 1553 united Mary and Elizabeth in common defence of their rights as heirs to Henry VIII, they also brought the Queen of Scots to the fore as a rival to both. The basis of Mary Stuart’s claim from this point on was that she was the one descendent of Henry VII untainted by either illegitimacy or heresy
  • The Wars of the Roses effectively destroyed the male members of the House of Lancaster (the descendants of John of Gaunt) and Henry VII and Henry VIII completed the process. By Edward VI’s death in 1553 all the main claimants to the English crown were women, and such men as had a claim owed it to a female descent. This was the case with Henry VII himself, and moreover his mother (Lady Margaret Beaufort) was descended from John of Gaunt’s illegitimate family
  • Elizabeth’s alienation from Philip also inspired a reconciliation with France that effectively lasted for the rest of her reign
  • The events of 1553 made Elizabeth’s place in the succession an international issue.
  • Elizabeth’s ability to turn to France on her accession was hampered by Mary Stuart’s position as Dauphine and, after July 1559, Queen of France. Until her death in 1587, Mary was the pole around which Elizabeth’s foreign policy revolved
  • The furthest concession Elizabeth appears to have made to Mary was to offer a new settlement that would have circumvented the treaty of Edinburgh in the months following James VI’s birth in June 1566.
  • The revelation of Mary’s understanding with Philip II and their plans for Elizabeth’s deposition marked the next stage in Elizabeth’s foreign relations
  • Philip of Spain had a strong claim as descendant of the legitimate daughters of Gaunt’s second marriage
  • Elizabeth’s hesitation over the Netherlands was overcome by the arrival of Don Juan of Austria as the new Governor General in late 1576
  • Throughout the ensuing negotiations she made no secret of the fact that what she really wanted was an alliance with Henry III. What she could not control was the decision of William of Orange in the winter of 1579-80 (partly on the strength of the marriage negotiations) to break with Spain and offer the lordship of the Netherlands to Anjou
  • Enterprise of England she could not allow Philip II to regain the Netherlands, whatever Henry III did
  • She now had the opportunity to form a new relationship in defence of his claim to the succession
  • Navarre was heir to the childless Henry III under the Salic Law, but bitterly opposed on account of his religion. This – it was now appreciated in England – was something that Henry III was trying to circumvent. In 1589 the two kings allied and following Henry III’s assassination in July, Navarre succeeded him as Henry IV
  • Throughout the 1590s, even if the war with Spain was not as successful as was occasionally hoped, defeat was not an issue
  • Henry IV may have converted and then made a separate peace with Philip II in 1598, but he remained an ally
  • If there was an ironic aspect to Elizabeth taking Mary’s place as James’s mother, this was also the case with Essex
  • However, Elizabeth, James and Henry formed a triumvirate of monarchs
  • She is a haughty woman, falling easily into rebuke, and above all when any speak of the king [Henry IV] whom she considers for a long time to have been greatly beholding to her
  • Philip II’s last years were embittered by disparaging comparisons
  • These last twenty-one years that the queen of England has spent in the service of the world will be the most outstanding known of in history
manhefnawi

James IV: Renaissance Monarch | History Today - 0 views

www.historytoday.com/...james-iv-renaissance-monarch

Scotland James IV Henry VIII France Kings England Queen Margaret

shared by manhefnawi on 21 May 18 - No Cached
  • In June 1488, just three years after Henry VII’s unlikely victory in the English Midlands, James IV became king on the battlefield of Sauchieburn south of Stirling, close to the spot where Robert Bruce had won his great victory over the English at Bannockburn in 1314.
  • James IV was brought up at Stirling Castle by his mother, Margaret of Denmark, alongside his two younger brothers. The queen had produced three healthy sons but she and James III led separate lives after an earlier rebellion in 1482. The king, who had managed to alienate all of his siblings, believed that his wife had sided with his brother, the Duke of Albany, when the duke returned from exile in France and invaded Scotland with the future Richard III of England. James III seems also to have felt that his eldest son was tainted by contact with Albany and perhaps considered barring the boy from the succession
  • James IV was ruler of a land famously described in a letter written by its own nobility in 1320 to Pope John XXII as ‘the tiny country of Scotia lying on the very edge of the inhabited world’. Scotland was poor, cold and wet. Edinburgh, its capital, held only 12,000 citizens, in contrast to London’s 50,000. Yet, like its new monarch, the country was not inward-looking.  Difficulty of travel by road over rugged terrain meant that it had long relied on sea routes for transport and communication with the wider world. The kings of Scotland were determined not to be overlooked in Europe. They forged trade and political alliances with Scandinavia and were long-standing allies of the French, who viewed Scotland as a brake on the ambitions of England. The two countries that occupied the island of Britain were natural enemies, nowhere more so than in the Borders, where centuries-old feuds and the violence that fuelled them were adjudicated by special courts composed of English and Scots. But James III had attempted a policy of conciliation with England that was unpopular with his aristocracy and Henry VII, a cautious man, did not relish constant war with his northern neighbour. It remained to be seen how James IV would approach Anglo-Scottish relations and how he would develop his ambition to make Scotland a European power.
  • ...18 more annotations...
  • His first years on the throne of Scotland were as troubled and insecure as those of Henry VII in England. In the early 1490s the threat of rebellion was never far away. James’ experience of life outside Stirling Castle was limited but he was a young man of keen intelligence and a shrewd observer of court politics
  • Foreign policy was traditionally the king’s preserve and it was here he would first show his mettle. He chose to do so in a way that had potentially grave repercussions for Henry VII.
  • In November 1495 the imposter Perkin Warbeck, who claimed to be Richard, Duke of York, the younger son of Edward IV, was warmly welcomed to Stirling by James IV
  • Henry VII was also looking for a wife for his son, Arthur, in Spain and James knew that the stability of Anglo-Scottish relations was important for the marriage negotiations to succeed.
  • He was sending a clear message to Henry VII that he had the means to threaten the Tudor throne. In the summer of 1496 he backed this up with military might when he and the Scottish host crossed the river Tweed into England with ‘Richard IV’ in their midst.
  • A proxy marriage took place at Richmond a few months after the wedding of Prince Arthur and Katherine of Aragon. The new Queen of Scots did not, however, go north to live with her husband until the summer of 1503. She was still several months short of her 14th birthday when, after a magnificent and demanding progress north, intended to showcase the splendour of the Tudor regime, she finally met James IV in early August at Dalkeith Castle
  • Over time, considerable affection grew between them and a mutual commitment to establishing their line and enhancing Scotland’s prestige. Once she reached the age of 16 Margaret did her duty valiantly, producing children most years, though none survived for long before she gave birth to the future James V in 1512. The king and queen kept a cultured Renaissance court, encouraging the flowering of Scottish literature, enjoying their mutual love of music and attracting artisans, intellectuals and men of science from all over Europe
  • Establishing Scotland as a European power cost money and James’ exchequer was constantly challenged once Margaret Tudor’s substantial dowry had been paid
  • James was also interested in medicine and dentistry, practising his skills on courtiers who gamely allowed themselves to have teeth extracted. Thomas Wolsey, then a rising prospect in Henry VII’s administration, was once kept waiting for an audience with the king because James was busy making gunpowder
  • In the summer of 1506 James wrote to his ally, Louis XII of France, setting forth his determination to develop a fleet that would be the key to defending Scotland from her enemies. He wanted it to be able to stand comparison with that of much bigger European powers. A northern ally with a substantial naval presence was music to the ears of the French king.
  • As his stock rose in Europe it became apparent that this would lead to tensions with his wife’s brother. Henry VIII was irritated by what he saw as the pretentions of James IV and Queen Margaret. The rivalry that soon became apparent was fuelled not just by a boy’s contempt for an older man but by the long-standing resentment that Henry felt for Margaret, who had briefly taken precedence over him before she left for Scotland.
  • Henry and Katherine remained childless and the uncomfortable truth, which Henry studiously ignored, was that his sister was his heir. If he were to die, James IV would effectively rule both kingdoms of the British Isles. His dynastic ambitions at home unfulfilled, Henry aspired to play a greater role in Europe. The main prize for Henry was not Scotland, but France. Yet it was in pursuit of this dream, a yearning to go back to the glory days of Henry V, that he would come into conflict with his brother-in-law and the Treaty of Perpetual Peace would be destroyed
  • Our husband knows it is witholden for his sake and will recompense us
  • By 1512 this family feud formed part of the wider backdrop of European war, as Henry VIII, in alliance with the Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian, declared war against Louis XII of France
  • James visited Margaret and their son at Linlithgow in early August 1513 before he left for Edinburgh to oversee military preparations, praying for success in the beautiful church of St Michael just outside the palace gates. On August 13th the Scottish host, sporting the latest artillery technology, 20 pieces of cannon made of brass and supported by European experts in field warfare, left Edinburgh in a mighty procession of men and arms.
  • The old Earl of Surrey, a veteran of the Wars of the Roses, who accompanied Margaret Tudor on her journey to Scotland ten years previously, had moved rapidly north and now stood in James’ way
  • The Scots were stunned by their loss, though they did not fall apart. Henry VIII, fighting a desultory and vainglorious little war in France, had neither the interest nor the ability to follow up Surrey’s unlikely victory and James V grew up to carry on his father’s rivalry with the English monarch as the prolonged struggle between the Tudors and the Stewarts continued
  • The belief that Scotland as an independent kingdom died with James IV developed well after the event and has damaged his reputation. But it also fails to recognise his achievements. A true Renaissance monarch, he had made Scotland into a European power and his people mourned him greatly.
Javier E

Growing List of Countries Agree on Net-Zero Emissions Goal | Time - 0 views

time.com/...ssions-new-york-european-union

climate change net-zero emissions goal 2050

shared by Javier E on 04 Jul 19 - No Cached
  • As lawmakers around the world debate how best to fight climate change, one goal is rapidly becoming standard: net-zero emissions by 2050.
  • That means that greenhouse gases would be dramatically reduced — most likely by using a combination of switching from coal and gas to wind and solar, becoming more energy-efficient and putting taxes or fees on carbon — and whatever remains would be offset by planting trees or using budding technology to pull carbon dioxide out of the air.
  • two key problems remain: the worst polluters, including the United States, haven’t yet signed on, and most places still need to figure out the details of how they will reach their goal.
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  • “We are in a very dangerous position now where action could go forward or backward,” Climate Analytics CEO Bill Hare told reporters Wednesday. “The next 12 months or so will really tell.”
  • Research from Climate Analytics released in early 2015, for example, suggested that global greenhouse emissions would need to hit zero by 2100 at the latest to have a good chance of keeping temperatures from rising more than 2°C by the end of the century
  • “Ambitious plans are very good but not enough,” says Niklas Höhne, a founding partner of NewClimate Institute. “They need to be cast in stone with laws and regulation.”
  • There’s an even bigger elephant in the room: such bold climate proposals are not on the table for the world’s three biggest emitters, the U.S., China and India
  • Global emissions rose last year at the fastest rate in years thanks in large part to a spike in those countries even as emissions fell in the European Union, Japan and elsewhere.
  • Prior to Donald Trump’s election, the U.S. federal government had suggested the country could implement policies to reduce emissions 80% by 2050, which would have been a significant move in direction of a net-zero target
  • Trump has not only done away with long-term thinking to reduce the country’s emissions but targeted a slew of environmental rules for rollback. Carbon emissions rose last year more than 3% even as cities and states continued their own pushes to reduce emissions.
  • China has reversed a ban on the construction of new coal-fired power plants while India is projected to continue to grow its use of that fossil fuel. Others including Brazil and Australia are also backtracking on their climate change commitments.
davisem

Trump, Propaganda and the Destruction of the Free Press | At the Edge | US News - 0 views

www.usnews.com/...-destruction-of-the-free-press

trump

shared by davisem on 10 Nov 17 - No Cached
  • President Trump on Sunday leveraged a recent Politico/Morning Consult poll to prove a point he's been trying to make for months. "It is finally sinking through. 46% OF PEOPLE BELIEVE MAJOR NATIONAL NEWS ORGS FABRICATE STORIES ABOUT ME. FAKE NEWS, even worse! Lost cred," the president tweeted.
  • He and his advisers fomented Lugenpresse – the concept of "lying press" made famous by the Nazi party in Germany during Adolf Hitler's rise to power -- to undermine journalists covering his presidential campaign at every stop.
  • The process was accelerated by Facebook and Google, two companies that control information access for millions of people and allowed fake news to be presented, unfiltered, to voters around the country.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • We are now more than a generation away from Nazi Germany and the roots of the conflict that precipitated World War II
  • Today, in the U.S., we are just one nuclear confrontation away from becoming a nation where martial law and a military-controlled mass surveillance state will be viewed as a relief by many citizens.
  • Adolf Hitler and his state media chief, Joseph Goebbels, forged plans for the Nazi party's Ministry of Propaganda and Public Enlightenment during peacetime, long before the onset of World war II. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, it was an unprecedented, and largely unnoticed, strategy.
  • The second half of successful propaganda – the "national education" of the people by the government, as Goebbels so accurately portrayed it - relies on a confluence and collaboration between the state and mass media that voters consume.
  • davisem on 10 Nov 17
     
    Trump is saying that the news fabricates stories, and that is what the Nazi party invented when Hitler came into power. If we destroy the media's credibility, we could be a country with people being relieved that they are a military-controlled country. We see scary similarities with how Trump rose to power and Hitler as well.
Javier E

Scary, judgmental old men - The Washington Post - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...7-81bc-c55a220c8cbe_story.html

moral moral elevation renewal reform culture transformation women harassment

shared by Javier E on 24 Nov 17 - No Cached
  • he sexual harassment revolution emerged from society in spite of — or even in defiance of — a president who has boasted of exploiting women and who stands accused of harassing more than a dozen.
  • This is a reminder that the moral dynamics of a nation are complex, which should come as no surprise to conservatives (at least of the Burkean variety)
  • Politics reaches only the light zone of a deep ocean. It is a sign of hope that moral and ethical standards can assert themselves largely unaided by political, entertainment and media leaders
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • What seemed for generations the prerogative of powerful men has been fully revealed as a pernicious form of dehumanization. Men such as Bill O’Reilly, Harvey Weinstein and Charlie Rose have been exposed at their moments of maximum cruelty and creepiness — just as their alleged victims (on credible testimony) experienced them. An ethical light switch was flipped. Moral outrage — the appropriate response — now seems obvious.
  • Over a period of years, this is what happened with the same-sex marriage movement. A type of inclusion that initially appeared radical and frightening became an obvious form of fairness to a majority of Americans.
  • We are seeing an example of how social change often (and increasingly) takes place. Advocates of a cause can push for a long time with little apparent effect. Then, in a historical blink, what seemed incredible becomes inevitable.
  • Such rapid shifts in social norms should be encouraging to social reformers of various stripes. Attitudes and beliefs do not move on a linear trajectory. A period of lightning clarity can change the assumptions and direction of a culture.
  • The movement against capital punishment, for example, may be reaching such a point.
  • Advocates of gun control, in contrast, seem to have an endless wait. But the record of our times counsels against despair.
  • how we got here is instructive. Conservatives have sometimes predicted that moral relativism would render Americans broadly incapable of moral judgment. But people, at some deep level, know that rules and norms are needed. They understand that character — rooted in empathy and respect for the rights and dignity of others — is essential in every realm of life, including the workplace.
  • Conservatives need to be clear and honest in this circumstance. The strong, moral commitment to the dignity of women and children recently asserting itself in our common life has mainly come from feminism, not the “family values” movement. In this case, religious conservatives have largely been bystanders or obstacles. This indicates a group of people for whom the dignity of girls and women has become secondary to other political goals.
  • We are a nation with vast resources of moral renewal. It is a shame and a scandal that so many religious conservatives have made themselves irrelevant to that task.
ethanshilling

Business and Stock Market Updates - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...stock-market-today

US business pandemic

shared by ethanshilling on 05 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • Hiring picked up last month as states lifted restrictions and stepped up vaccination efforts, with the government reporting on Friday that the American economy added 379,000 jobs last month.
  • But there are still about 9.5 million fewer jobs today than a year ago. Congress is considering a $1.9 trillion package of pandemic relief intended to carry struggling households and businesses through the coming months.
  • The unemployment rate in February was 6.2 percent, down from the previous month’s rate of 6.3 percent.
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  • “We’re still in a pandemic economy,” said Julia Coronado, founder of MacroPolicy Perspectives and a former Federal Reserve economist. “Millions of people are looking for work and willing to work, but they are constrained from working.”
  • More than four million people have quit the labor force in the last year, including those sidelined because of child care and other family responsibilities or health concerns.
  • Most of the February gains came in the leisure and hospitality industries, including restaurant and bars, which have been particularly hard hit by the pandemic. “There’s still a long way to go,” Ms. Pollak said
  • The labor market gained 379,000 jobs in February, yet unemployment rates for Black workers rose, underlining the uneven damage the pandemic continued to inflict.
  • Unemployment among Black women over 20 rose to 8.9 percent from 8.5 percent the prior month, while the rate for Black men older than 20 increased to 10.2 percent from 9.4 percent.
  • Black people hold 1.5 million fewer jobs than they did a year ago, down nearly 8 percent since the start of the pandemic. White workers, who make up a bigger share of the American population, have lost 6.3 million jobs — down 5 percent.
  • “Over the course of a long expansion, these persistent disparities can decline significantly,” Jerome H. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, said in a recent speech, though he added that “without policies to address their underlying causes, they may increase again when the economy ultimately turns down.”
mimiterranova

Anti-Asian hate crimes increased by nearly 150% in 2020, mostly in N.Y. and L.A., new r... - 0 views

www.nbcnews.com/...rly-150-2020-mostly-n-n1260264

hate crimes culture

shared by mimiterranova on 12 Mar 21 - No Cached
  • he analysis released by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, this month examined hate crimes in 16 of America’s largest cities. It revealed that while such crimes in 2020 decreased overall by 7 percent, those targeting Asian people rose by nearly 150 percent.
  • What Trump did is that he weaponized it in a way,” Ramakrishnan said. “Trump's rhetoric helps set a certain narrative in place — and presidents have an outsized role in terms of shaping narrative. They don't call it a bully pulpit for nothing, and especially Trump, the way he frequently used Twitter as well as press conferences and off-the-cuff remarks to campaign rallies to frame the narrative in a particular way, it likely played a role.”
  • The analysis revealed a surge in cities such as New York, where anti-Asian hate crimes rose from three in 2019 to 28 in 2020, a 833 percent increase. Los Angeles and Boston also experienced notable rises, from seven to 15 and six to 14, respectively. Meanwhile, Washington, D.C., experienced a decline from six to three anti-Asian hate crimes. Chicago remained unchanged, with two crimes each year.
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  • The first spike in anti-Asian hate crimes occurred in March and April last year. However, it occurred alongside a rise in Covid-19 cases and ongoing negative associations of Asian Americans with the virus, the analysis noted.
  • A separate study revealed that the use of “China virus” language to refer to the coronavirus, particularly by GOP officials and conservative outlets, has already resulted in a shift in how many people in the U.S. perceive Asian Americans. The significant uptick in discriminatory coronavirus speech that occurred on March 8 — the day Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., tweeted about the “Wuhan virus,” which coincided with then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s interview the day before on "Fox and Friends" in which he referred to the "China virus" — was followed by a rapid reversal of a decadelong decline in anti-Asian bias.
  • "Many of these Chinatowns are in places that are low income and also suffering economically. So that might be one set of explanations as to why this phenomenon is taking this particular shape," he said. "On top of that, we live in an age of viral social media, and … especially the shock value of some of these videos increases awareness and maybe anxiety in the community.
aidenborst

Pandemic lockdowns tied to lower crime in many cities, study finds - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

politics US history crisis Culture Pandemic Crime Lockdown

shared by aidenborst on 02 Jun 21 - No Cached
  • Stay-at-home policies put into effect to help control the spread of Covid-19 were linked with a 37% average reduction in crime in 27 cities across 23 countries, an international team of researchers reported Wednesday.
  • Robberies and thefts fell the most -- by 46% -- perhaps as people stayed at home instead of going to work. Homicides fell 14%, the researchers reported in the journal Nature Human Behaviour.
  • "On average, the overall reduction in crime levels across all included cities was around 37%."
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • "The smaller decrease in homicide cases may be due to a number of factors. First, in many societies, a substantial proportion of homicides are committed in domestic contexts and are hence not affected by the reduction in the density of daily encounters in cities. Second, a varying proportion of homicide is associated with organized crime, conflicts between gangs or conflicts related to drug trafficking," the team wrote.
  • "As most people stayed at home throughout the day, fewer houses were left unsupervised and residential burglary may have become much more difficult, while commercial buildings likely became less supervised and hence an easier target," they added. Also, fewer bar fights were reported, but the potential for domestic violence rose.
  • Burglaries fell by 84% in Lima and rose by 38% in San Francisco, the researchers found. Police in many US cities have reported significant increases in violent crime with the pandemic.
  • The strictness of lockdown laws did not seem to directly correlate with changes in crime, the researchers found.
  • "The results show that more severe restrictions on school opening, working from home, public events, private gatherings and internal movement are not significantly related to the size of effects, with one exception: More stringent reductions or closures of public transportation are associated with more negative effect sizes for robbery and vehicle theft only," they wrote.
kaylynfreeman

Live Covid-19 Updates: Trump Doctor is Giving a Health Update Now - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...trump-covid-live-updates

shared by kaylynfreeman on 13 Jan 21 - No Cached
  • President Trump entered his third day in the hospital on Sunday after contracting the coronavirus and falling ill last week, even as confusing and contradictory accounts about his medical condition added to the national sense of uncertainty and concern for the 74-year-old president’s well-being.
    • kaylynfreeman
      kaylynfreeman on 13 Jan 21
       
      It's embarrassing that he made fun of joe for wearing a mask and then contracts the virus a day after.
  • looked much paler
    • kaylynfreeman
      kaylynfreeman on 13 Jan 21
       
      He did not get the chance to self tan.
  • “The president’s vitals over the last 24 hours were very concerning,” Mr. Meadows said. “And the next 48 hours will be critical in terms of his care.”
    • kaylynfreeman
      kaylynfreeman on 13 Jan 21
       
      He might be trying to downplay his condition or push back the election and say its not a fair election
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Mr. Biden tested negative on Friday and said he would be tested again on Sunday. His campaign vowed to make public the results of all future tests.
    • kaylynfreeman
      kaylynfreeman on 13 Jan 21
       
      Because he actually wears his mask
  • At least seven people who attended a White House event on Sept. 26 have since tested positive for the coronavirus. Six of them, including the first lady, sat in the first several rows of a Supreme Court nomination ceremony for Judge Amy Coney Barrett in the White House Rose Garden. The seventh was the president himself.
  • Two people close to the White House said in separate interviews with The New York Times that the president had experienced trouble breathing on Friday and that his blood oxygen level had dropped, prompting his doctors to give him supplemental oxygen at the White House and then to transfer him to Walter Reed.
mariedhorne

U.S. Retail Sales Fell 0.7% in December as Covid-19 Cases Rose - WSJ - 0 views

www.wsj.com/...ronavirus-recovery-11610676272

covid-19 economy

shared by mariedhorne on 18 Jan 21 - No Cached
  • Retail sales, a measure of purchases at stores, restaurants and online, declined a seasonally adjusted 0.7% in December from the prior month, the Commerce Department said Friday. That marked the third consecutive month of declines, and November’s retail sales were revised lower to a 1.4% drop, after a stretch of growth last spring and summer.
  • According to the National Retail Federation, holiday sales rose 8.3% compared with the same period a year ago, exceeding the trade group’s estimate of a 3.6% to 5.2% increase. Home-improvement and online retailers posted big gains, while sales at apparel chains and department stores—which historically tend to do well during the season—continued to decline. Holiday sales exclude restaurants, gasoline and auto sales, and measure the year-over-year gains in the combined November-December period.
  • Recent private-sector data suggested a mixed start to this year. NPD Group, which tracks retailers, said Thursday that sales at retailers focused on items such as apparel and personal-care products increased 27% in the week ended Jan. 9—the largest increase in that category since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s tracker of 30 million credit and debit cardholders recorded a 2.7% decline in spending from a year earlier in the week through Jan. 11.
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  • Physical traffic to retail stores fell sharply this holiday season, according to firms that use sensors and cameras to track in-store shopping. Between Nov. 22 and Jan. 2, store traffic dropped 33% year-over-year, according to Sensormatic Solutions, which uses cameras and software to track visits to thousands of malls and shopping centers. By contrast, in November and December online sales grew 32.2% year-over-year to $188.2 billion,
Javier E

Want a Green New Deal? Here's a better one. - The Washington Post - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...9-af5b-b51b7ff322e9_story.html

GND climate change activism reform policy

shared by Javier E on 24 May 19 - No Cached
  • the goal is so fundamental that policymakers should focus above all else on quickly and efficiently decarbonizing. They should not muddle this aspiration with other social policy, such as creating a federal jobs guarantee,
  • the goal is so monumental that the country cannot afford to waste dollars in its pursuit. If the market can redirect spending most efficiently, money should not be misallocated on vast new government spending or mandates.
  • we propose our own Green New Deal. It relies both on smart government intervention — and on transforming the relentless power of the market from an obstacle to a centerpiece of the solution.
  • ...25 more annotations...
  • U.S. natural gas is far less damaging to the environment than coal. It has become so cheap that it is displacing coal in electricity generation, driving down emissions. To others, Cove Point is an environmental catastrophe. Natural gas is still a fossil fuel, and burning it releases lots of greenhouse-gas emissions, which cause climate change. Both arguments are right.
  • society must eliminate its carbon dependency. It cannot burn vast amounts of any fossil fuel for “decades and decades,” as Mr. Farrell hopes, unless there is a revolution in emissions capture technology. Even in the short term, U.S. emissions are rising, despite the restraint that stepped-up natural-gas burning has provided. The government must demand more change, more quickly.
  • One objection is that carbon pricing is not powerful enough. The European Union’s carbon pricing program has not worked well. But that is a failure of design and political will. A carbon price equal to the challenge would start high and rise higher, sending a much stronger price signal.
  • carbon pricing is still the best first-line policy
  • A high-enough carbon price would shape millions of choices, small and large, about what to buy, how to invest and how to live that would result in substantial emissions cuts. People would prioritize the easiest changes, minimizing the costs of the energy transition. With a price that steadily rose, market forces would steadily wring carbon dioxide out of the economy — without the government trying to dictate exactly how, wasting money on special-interest boondoggles.
  • The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found last year that an average carbon price between 2030 and the end of the century of $100, $200 or even $300 per ton of carbon dioxide would result in huge greenhouse-gas emissions cuts, could restrain warming to the lowest safety threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius and would almost certainly prevent the world from breaching the traditional warming limit of 2 degrees Celsius
  • Republicans never embraced the market-based idea, even though conservative economists admit its appeal, because they never accepted the need to act at all. Some environmentalists, meanwhile, are increasingly wary of carbon pricing. The Democrats’ Green New Deal, which is noncommittal on the policy, reflects the accelerating drift from the obvious.
  • Another criticism is that carbon pricing hurts the poor, who would suffer most when prices rose. But the revenue from carbon pricing could be recycled back to Americans in a progressive way, and most people would end up whole or better off.
  • A third objection is that carbon pricing is politically impossible, because it reveals the cost of fighting global warming in the prices people pay
  • This is a leadership challenge, not a policy challenge. More than 40 governments globally, including several states, have found the political will to embrace carbon pricing programs, which is the only option that would plausibly be bipartisan.
  • One objection does have merit: Though carbon pricing would spur huge change in infrastructure and power generation, that alone would not be enough. It would not stimulate all the innovation the nation needs in the climate fight, nor would it change behaviors in circumstances where the desired price signal is muted or nonexistent
  • Start with carbon pricing. Then fill in the gaps.
  • , economists know that companies that invest in research and development do not get rewarded for the full social value of their work. Others benefit from their innovations without paying. Consequently, firms do not invest in research as much as society should want
  • It would take only a small fraction of the revenue a carbon pricing system would produce to fund a much more ambitious clean-energy research agenda. Basic scientific research and applied research programs such as ARPA-E should be scaled up dramatically
  • The government must also account for the fact that not all greenhouse-gas emissions come from burning the fuels that a carbon pricing program would reach — coal, oil and gas. How would the government charge farmers for the methane their cows emit or for the greenhouse gases released when they till their soil? How about emissions from cement, ammonia and steel production? The federal government would have to tailor programs to the agricultural and industrial sectors, which might include judicious use of incentives and mandates.
  • only government can ensure adequate mass transit options. Local governments could help with zoning laws to encourage people to live in denser, more walkable communities. The federal government should also press automakers to steadily improve fuel efficiency.
  • That starts with making sure that emissions-cutting efforts at home do not have unintended consequences. If the United States puts a price on greenhouse-gas emissions, other countries would lure U.S. manufacturers with the promise of lax environmental rules. Relocated manufacturers could then export their goods to the United States. The net effect would be no benefit for the planet but fewer U.S. manufacturing jobs.
  • One response is a kind of tariff on goods entering the country from places with weaker carbon-dioxide policies. That would both eliminate the incentive to offshore manufacturing and encourage countries to strengthen their own rules.
  • Participating in the agreement would give the United States a forum — and a basis — to press other nations to reduce emissions.
  • Foreign aid to prevent deforestation could be among the most cost-effective climate-preserving measures. Helping other countries to replace archaic cooking stoves that produce noxious fumes would help cut emissions and improve quality of life across the developing world.
  • There are a lot of bad ideas out there.
  • The Green New Deal that some Democrats have embraced is case in point. In its most aggressive form, the plan suggests the country could reach net-zero greenhouse-gas emissions by 2030, an impossible goal
  • that would be more spent every three years than the total amount the country spent on World War II.
  • At the same time, the Democratic plan would guarantee every American “high-quality health care” and “a job with a family-sustaining wage, adequate family and medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security.” These expensive aspirations, no matter how laudable, would do nothing to arrest greenhouse-gas emissions.
  • Massive social reform will not protect the climate. Marshaling every dollar to its highest benefit is the strongest plan.
bluekoenig

The secret student resistance to Hitler - Iseult Gillespie - YouTube - 0 views

www.youtube.com/watch

history culture crisis nazi germany the white rose teded hitler

shared by bluekoenig on 16 Jan 20 - No Cached
  • bluekoenig on 16 Jan 20
     
    This is a video about The White Rose movement in the 1940's, a secret college group that dispersed leaflets to encourage Germans not to support Hitler. The two siblings who lead it had been part of the Hitler youth and questioned Nazism later in life. In college, they found a group of students who shared their ideas and printed leaflets that they spread across Munich. The students were later reported to the Gestapo by a janitor who witnessed their crimes and were put to death by the government.
mariedhorne

U.S. Economy Recovered Significant Ground in Record Third-Quarter GDP Rebound - WSJ - 0 views

www.wsj.com/...third-quarter-2020-11603908566

economy pandemic crisis

shared by mariedhorne on 02 Nov 20 - No Cached
  • The increase in growth, the biggest jump in records dating to 1947, followed a record decline earlier in the pandemic when the virus disrupted business activity across the country
  • That puts the economy about 3.5% smaller than at the end of last year, before the pandemic hit.
  • The third-quarter GDP increase followed a 9% quarter-to-quarter decline in the second quarter, or a 31.4% annualized drop, adjusted for inflation and seasonal fluctuations. U.S. GDP is normally reported at an annual rate, or as if the quarter’s pace of growth continued for a full year.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • The number of workers filing initial claims for unemployment insurance fell by 40,000 to 751,000 last week to the lowest level since the pandemic began, suggesting layoffs are easing despite a rise in coronavirus infections. The U.S. as of September has recovered about half of the 22 million jobs lost in March and April, at the beginning of the pandemic.
  • On average they expect that the economy will contract 3.6% this year, measured from the fourth quarter of 2019.
  • JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s tracker of credit and debit-card transactions showed that spending was down 5.2% from a year earlier in the week through Oct. 25.
  • Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic output, increased at a 40.7% annual rate in the third quarter.
  • which reflects business spending on software, research and development, equipment and structures—rose at a 20.3% annual rate. Spending on equipment rose, although spending on structures, a category tied to the struggling oil and gas sector and commercial real estate, fell at a 14.6% annual rate.
  • Third-quarter revenue is up 44% from a year earlier, following an initial drop in business in March and April when customers were reluctant to have work crews in their homes, he said.
rerobinson03

Why the Ottoman Empire rose and fell - 0 views

www.nationalgeographic.com/...why-ottoman-empire-rose-fell

shared by rerobinson03 on 02 Nov 20 - No Cached
  • Known as one of history’s most powerful empires, the Ottoman Empire grew from a Turkish stronghold in Anatolia into a vast state that at its peak reached as far north as Vienna, Austria, as far east as the Persian Gulf, as far west as Algeria, and as far south as Yemen.
  • Osman I, a leader of a nomadic Turkic tribe from Anatolia (modern-day Turkey), began conquering the region in the late 13th century by launching raids against the weakening Christian Byzantine Empire.
  • Around 1299, he declared himself supreme leader of Asia Minor, and his successors expanded farther and farther into Byzantine territory with the help of foreign mercenaries.
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  • In 1453, Osman’s descendants, now known as the Ottomans, finally brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees when they captured the seemingly unconquerable city of Constantinople.
  • It would take a world war to end the Ottoman Empire for good.
  • Now a dynastic empire with Istanbul as its capital, the Ottoman Empire continued to expand across the Balkans, the Middle East, and North Africa.
  • At its height, the Ottoman Empire was a real player in European politics and was home to more Christians than Muslims.
  • the arts flourished, technology and architecture reached new heights, and the empire generally enjoyed peace, religious tolerance, and economic and political stability.
  • The Young Turks who now ruled the Ottoman Empire wanted to strengthen it, spooking its Balkan neighbors. The Balkan Wars that followed resulted in the loss of 33 percent of the empire’s remaining territory and up to 20 percent of its population.
  • As World War I loomed, the Ottoman Empire entered into a secret alliance with Germany. The war that followed was disastrous. More than two thirds of the Ottoman military became casualties during World War I, and up to 3 million civilians died.
mattrenz16

Opinion: The single most important quality a president must have - CNN - 0 views

www.cnn.com/...index.html

shared by mattrenz16 on 02 Nov 20 - No Cached
  • President Donald Trump upended countless longstanding norms when he took office, prompting Americans, foreign allies and enemies alike to wonder, what does the office of the presidency really stand for?
  • One night after moving into a brand new White House in November 1800, then-President John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail and included a short prayer: "I pray Heaven to bestow the best of Blessings on this House, and on all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise Men ever rule under this roof."
  • Faith in elected leaders rose to 55% in 2002, but by 2015 -- just before Trump took office -- it had dropped again, this time to only 19% of Americans saying they trusted the federal government all or most of the time.
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  • First, our next president should set a new tone in the White House on day one, proclaiming that honesty, dignity and respect for others will be the new marching orders. In the aftermath of Watergate, when former President Richard Nixon was forced out in disgrace, I saw his successor -- Gerald Ford -- change the atmosphere within hours. Ford proclaimed "that truth is the glue" that holds us all together. He believed it and soon his followers did, too.
  • If he or she is open and honest, that is the path they will walk; but if he or she acts more like a mobster, bullying and lying to those in his midst, some of them will eventually copy this behavior. So, the question before us is simple: Will the wise and the honest prevail over the next four years? The answer really rests with you, the voters. You are the ultimate stewards of our democracy.
  • Washington Post cataloging his over 20,000 false or misleading statements.
  • These sentiments about honor and wisdom, shared for over two centuries by our best presidents, are now at the center of this year's presidential contest.
  • Within a decade, faith in the federal government as a whole dropped 41 points.
  • Faith in elected leaders rose to 55% in 2002, but by 2015 -- just before Trump took office -- it had dropped again, this time to only 19% of Americans saying they trusted the federal government all or most of the time.
  • Former President Franklin D. Roosevelt loved the prayer so much that in 1945 he had it engraved in the mantel above a stone fireplace in the State Dining Room.
  • And a recent Pew poll measuring international sentiments across 13 countries found that the international community was more trusting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping than of Trump.
  • Indeed, I believe that the restoration of trust should be the single highest priority of our next president. Everything else will flow from there.
  • First, our next president should set a new tone in the White House on day one, proclaiming that honesty, dignity and respect for others will be the new marching orders.
  • Ford proclaimed "that truth is the glue" that holds us all together. He believed it and soon his followers did, too.
  • Second, our next president needs every department to review and refresh its ethics codes and then require every new political appointee to attend no-nonsense briefings on what is in bounds and what is out of bounds.
  • Third, our next president needs to review and overhaul those who now serve as inspectors general across the federal landscape.
  • In writing his magisterial biography of Harry Truman, historian David McCullough concluded that character is the single most important quality a president must have.
  • So, the question before us is simple: Will the wise and the honest prevail over the next four years? The answer really rests with you, the voters. You are the ultimate stewards of our democracy.
Javier E

Society Has Become More Unequal Since Milton Friedman's Day - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ilton-friedman-inequality.html

friedman capitalism stockholder New Deal deregulation small government inequality social conscience history politics culture economics

shared by Javier E on 12 Sep 20 - No Cached
  • Fifty years ago, the economist Milton Friedman warned in his seminal essay, “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits,” that corporate executives would undermine the “basis of a free society” if they acted as if “business has a ‘social conscience’ and takes seriously its responsibilities for providing employment, eliminating discrimination, avoiding pollution and whatever else may be the watchwords of the contemporary crop of reformers.”
  • Instead of operating in a manner that treated all stakeholders fairly, Mr. Friedman argued, every corporation should seek solely to “increase its profits within the rules of the game.”
  • Not only that, Mr. Friedman sought to weaken the rules of the game by opposing basic civil rights legislation, unions, the minimum wage and other measures that protected workers, Black people, and the environment.
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  • Mr. Friedman’s cramped vision enhanced the power of the stock market and silenced the voice of workers, leading to profound inequality.
  • Mr. Friedman’s adherents gained influence in government and the business community. At the same time as Mr. Friedman’s adherents disparaged government’s role, they sought enormous tax subsidies, greatly reducing the share of taxes that corporations paid.
  • The promise of vital legislative protections against the excesses of unconstrained capitalism — including the National Labor Relations Act, minimum wage laws, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, antitrust regulations and consumer safety laws, to name a few — were undercut by two generations of ceaseless attack.
  • The concerns Mr. Friedman lampooned as obsessions of the “contemporary crop of reformers” in 1970 remain urgent problems
  • As would be expected when business leaders were told not to worry about “providing employment,” wages stagnated and inequality grew.
  • In the past 50 years, instead of gains for stockholders and top management tracking gains for workers — as characterized by the period when Mr. Friedman wrote — the returns of our capitalist system have become skewed toward the haves.
  • From 1948 to 1979, worker productivity grew by 108.1 percent and wages grew by 93.2 percent, with the stock market growing by 603 percent.
  • As would be expected when corporations were told not to worry about “avoiding pollution,” they used their muscle to undermine environmental protection and to conceal the dangers of climate change
  • As would be expected when corporate leaders were told not to worry about “eliminating discrimination,” corporate political spending was used to help seat elected officials who opposed measures designed to reduce racial disparities in education, pay and wealth, and to support gerrymandering and voter suppression efforts.
  • By contrast, from 1979 to 2018, worker productivity rose by 69.6 percent, but the wealth created by these productivity gains went predominately to executives and stockholders. Worker pay rose by only 11.6 percent during this period, while compensation for chief executives grew by an enormous 940 percent and the stock market grew by 2,200 percent.
  • the entire future of humanity is now at risk.
  • To reverse the Friedman paradigm, companies should embrace an affirmative duty to stakeholders and society. This requires tangible, publicly articulated goals, such as paying living wages to their workers, respecting workers’ right to join a union, promoting racial and gender inclusion and pay equity, enhancing safety protocols, and reducing carbon emissions
  • In doing so, corporate leaders will also set an example that institutional investors should be required to follow in their own investing and voting policies.
  • But adopting a stakeholder-centric governance model is only half the battle. Business leaders must support the restoration of fair rules of the game by government; respect the need for strong and resilient public institutions to govern a complex society; pay their fair share of taxes; and stop using corporate funds to distort our nation’s political process
  • Mr. Friedman wrote the influential essay at a time when economic security was strong, as the New Deal’s principles produced widespread prosperity, reduced poverty and helped Black Americans take their first real strides toward economic inclusion
  • Since then, the United States has gone backward in economic equality and security — a situation that the Covid-19 pandemic has exposed for all to see
  • America’s business community should heed these lessons of history and help restore the ideals of fairness, equality and economic common sense that showed that a capitalist economy could work for the many.
aidenborst

White House Is Not Contact Tracing 'Super-Spreader' Trump Rose Garden Event - The New Y... - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ntact-tracing-white-house.html

trump politics us pandemic coronavirus

shared by aidenborst on 06 Oct 20 - No Cached
  • Despite almost daily disclosures of new coronavirus infections among President Trump’s close associates, the White House is making little effort to investigate the scope and source of its outbreak.
  • The White House has decided not to trace the contacts of guests and staff members at the Rose Garden celebration 10 days ago for Judge Amy Coney Barrett, where at least eight people, including the president, may have become infected, according to a White House official familiar with the plans.Instead, it has limited its efforts to notifying people who came in close contact with Mr. Trump in the two days before his Covid diagnosis Thursday evening.
  • Even the contact tracing efforts within the two-day window have been limited, consisting mostly of emails notifying people of potential exposure, rather than the detailed phone conversations to warn anyone who may have been exposed, coach them on which symptoms to look for and counsel them to isolate if they do begin to show symptoms.
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  • “I guess an email is notification of exposure,” said Erin Sanders, a nurse practitioner and certified contact tracer in Boston. “But that is not contact tracing,” she said, “and not how a responsible public health agency handles a super-spreading cluster of a deadly virus.”
  • an internal C.D.C. email on Friday asked the agency’s scientists to be ready to go to Washington for contact tracing, but a request from the White House for assistance never came, according to two senior C.D.C. scientists.
  • Experts at the C.D.C. could have immediately put in place contact tracing for President Trump and others who have been infected, working with health departments of the states to which Mr. Trump and others have traveled. But regulations require that the C.D.C. be asked to step in.
  • During the 48-hour window before Mr. Trump’s diagnosis that White House contact tracers are focusing on, the president debated former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. in Cleveland; traveled to a rally of thousands in Minnesota; met with supporters and donors at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J.; and conferred with dozens of aides at the White House, all while not wearing a mask.
  • The timing of the diagnosis of Mr. Trump’s illness makes it highly likely that he and the others became infected on Saturday, medical experts said. Symptoms typically appear around five days after exposure to the virus; Mr. Trump began showing symptoms on Thursday, “right smack dab in the day” he would be expected to, Dr. Maldonado said.
  • “Staff should not go to the White House Medical Unit clinic for any Covid-19 testing inquiries,” the memo said. But some officials have continued to go to work.
aleija

Big Tech Continues Its Surge Ahead of the Rest of the Economy - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...ok-amazon-google-earnings.html

US history technology pandemic

shared by aleija on 30 Oct 20 - No Cached
  • While the rest of the U.S. economy languished earlier this year, the tech industry’s biggest companies seemed immune to the downturn, surging as the country worked, learned and shopped from home.
  • Combined, the four companies reported a quarterly net profit of $38 billion.
  • Amazon reported record sales, and an almost 200 percent rise in profits, as the pandemic accelerated the transition to online shopping. Despite a boycott of its advertising over the summer, Facebook had another blockbuster quarter.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • On Tuesday, Microsoft, Amazon’s closest competitor in cloud computing, also reported its most profitable quarter, growing 30 percent from a year earlier.
  • That slow return to health is also providing momentum to companies that suffered early in the pandemic
  • Twitter’s stock dropped about 14 percent in after-hours trading on Thursday
  • Sales were $96.1 billion, up 37 percent from a year earlier, and profits rose to $6.3 billion.
  • Amazon said sales could reach $121 billion in the fourth quarter because of the confluence of Prime Day, the holiday shopping season and the turn to online spending.
  • Apple’s services segment, which includes revenues from the App Store and offerings like Apple Music, increased 16 percent to $14.5 billion. Sales rose 46 percent for iPads, 29 percent for Mac computers and 21 percent for wearables.
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